Renew The Land. Speaker Profile: Myles Harrison
April 30, 2014
FMNR in East Africa
Speaker’s name: Myles Harrison
Position: Pacific & Timor-Leste Leader, World Vision International
Biography: Myles has held the positions of director of Strategy reporting to the World Vision International Partnership Leader Strategy; National Director for Sierra Leone; and Operations Director for Cambodia, Mauritania, Sierra Leone and Azerbaijan.
Most recently, Myles was Senior Director for Operations for East Africa based in Kenya. For a short period Myles stepped outside World Vision to co-lead the quality and global growth of Hagar International’s social mission.
With more than 18 years experience in international development and humanitarian work, Myles is now focussed on significantly contributing to the efforts of the PTL (Pacific & Timor-Leste) group to strengthen and improve impact on child wellbeing in Papua New Guinea, Timor-Leste, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu.
Presentation Summary
Significant change has been seen as a result of FMNR in East Africa. In Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and other countries we have begun to see:
- Improved crop production
- Soil protected from erosion
- Increase of the water table level
- Improved availability of other food and fruits, and firewood
- Increased fodder for livestock and even the return of some wildlife
- New income generating possibilities
Unlike many approaches to land and resource rehabilitation, or even development activities FMNR can spread rapidly because it is:
- There are no capital costs- requiring considerable up-front investment.
- It impacts at a household and community level
- The visible and financial return is relatively short (compared to other land/ resource rehabilitation)
- It is low technology and therefor easy for neighbours to copy
To get to scale requires local and National Government leadership and policy level support both encouraging FMNR, but also protecting environments once restored.
FMNR is working in East Africa- Timor Leste has an opportunity to exceed that success for the benefit of its people.